Travel interview
November 2009


Q: What are some of the most beautiful/interesting places you have traveled to?

A: The southwest is pretty high on the list for it's vast forbidden emptiness. Northern California. The wetlands of southern Louisiana. New Orleans, Memphis. The Florida Everglades. But in the end, the Northwest has my heart. Though I live here, I also traveled to get here, so I'll count it.


Q: Tell us a good story about one of your trips.

A: A few years ago some friends and I had a boat drop us off in a remote area of the North Cascades in Washington. It took us about a week to walk back to our car and during that time we saw only two other people - a pair of mountain climbers who were making their own trail to a glacier. The sense of solitude and self-sufficiency amid such wildness was transforming. At one point a bridge that was supposed to span a raging river was washed out, so we had to hack through the woods until we found a log that had fallen across it. It is a privilege to view a place you can only see if you do the work to get there.


Q:What is your favorite part about traveling?

A: The surprises. The way your mind works when you're on the move, always processing. Your concerns are different than they are at home, and everything is new.


Q: A lot of your photographs are based out of Oregon and Washington. Why do you choose to travel to the national parks in those states?

A: They choose me! I am surrounded by so much natural beauty, and the parks mark only a fraction of it. I could go out exploring everyday and never exhaust it.


Q: Where are you from and where do you currently live?

A: I grew up on the coast of Mississippi but I have lived in Portland Oregon for many years.


Q: Why do you choose to capture so much nature in your photographs?

A: Sense of place is important to me. Although anything can convey it, I am becoming fixated on what nature has to offer in that department right now. It also gives me a reason to drive around.